The Other Option
by ZukiYuki
Summary: Continuation from the cliff-hanger end in episode three. Sherlock/Moriarty Pairing. Contains old jokes, over reactions and of course, a hotel.


**Set straight after the end of Episode 3. That was such a cliff-hanger I had to continue it somehow :D obviously I don't own any of the characters or Sherlock as there would be a lot more… contact between Sherlock and Jim. Contains Slash.**

"I suppose there is _one_ more option…" Moriarty drawled, the teasing behind the statement highlighted beautifully by his Irish accent. Sherlock hesitated, feeling himself be drawn into the smaller yet no less intimidating man who stood casually in front of him. The 'criminal consultant' (Brilliant, Sherlock thought, just brilliant) continued without any need to be prompted, "…You two can go home."

Sherlock mentally scolded John for allowing a smile of disbelief to show on his face. There was a catch so obviously coming, how could he miss that? "But," there it was, "Sherlock must meet me at this time and place." Moriarty grinned triumphantly, flicking a small card across the tension between them. "I wonder which one you will pick?"

Moriarty took a step back and leant against the wall with a casual, feminine posture. Sherlock Holmes used the silence as an excuse to look him over again, feeling his heart accelerate as he did so. His eyes proceeded up to Moriarty's face, whose eyes quickly caught his looking. Humiliated, Sherlock looked away, furiously trying to repress the weird sensation of the need to blush. Hell, this had never, _never_, happened before. But then again, Sherlock had never met anyone as strangely fascinating, no one who was so similar to himself ever before. And then there was that one difference that kept Sherlock so enticed. Sherlock's constant boredom, his need to disrupt the calm, he always fought back and tried to keep civil; Moriarty acted on all of his emotions, unrestrained by Sherlock's self-inflicted limits. He was a criminal after all, something that Sherlock had dismissed as worth becoming. Yet whenever he 'played' with Moriarty, Sherlock found that boredom was so far away he began doubting his resolve. He wasn't a hero. But he couldn't be a villain. Moriarty was in a way all of Sherlock's secret wishes. He felt his pulse accelerating.

Replacing his gaze instead on the small rectangular laminated paper cut-out - So this had been carefully planned beforehand? Interesting. - Sherlock read the details. He might have known nothing of social conventions, of what certain events could entail or imply, but while he was set in his current state of mind, he managed to imagine for himself what could happen at that location. He could guess what that implied. Hotel rooms were usually thought of to contain a... a sleeping quarter. Sherlock's flush was inevitable as images he'd never before seen filled his already churning mind. Since when did he, Sherlock Holmes, a _professional_, even know how guys did stuff like that together?

Behind him, John made a noise in the back of his focus, stop acting like a normal person. Decision time. That would require logical thinking and accurate deductions. But Holmes knew, he knew from the second Jim Moriarty had made the offer that he wasn't going to turn it down. How could he say no to the single individual who had enthralled, excited, tormented, and intrigued him? Sherlock bent down slowly, lowering the gun, and he pocketed the card.

He glanced up to measure Moriarty's reaction. That smile - that crazed, genius, and somehow effortlessly amusing smile - was on his face again. Sherlock scowled, and hastily grabbed John's arm to leave. Getting out of there ASAP was more important than doing it with dignity. Sherlock was fairly sure he could still hold onto some pride and sanity; or at least he was until the whistle rang out.

"Nice Arse," commented a soft, Irish murmur.

In the end, Watson had to drag a frozen Holmes out.

"You're really going to go?" John demanded, once they were home and seated. That was why Sherlock kept someone with a lesser intelligence around him, it helped him regain his sense and sanity. All of which he had lost back at the swimming pool.

"Obviously John, what do you really think would happen if I didn't? The armed gunmen that turn up at our door will probably kill Mrs Hudson as well," Sherlock snipped irritably, venting his confusion on the stupidity of others, safe in the knowledge that John could take it. "Besides, it's not as if it will be that… bad." Sherlock added in a mumble, feeling his cheeks flare up again. It seemed that if his thoughts ever took to thinking about Moriarty they instantly became less clear.

"Not that bad? Holmes, you do understand what will happen there, don't you? Meet you in a hotel, at night? It's just like in those old gangster movies; he's going to kill you Holmes, _kill_ you."

"That's what it implies?" Sherlock asked, startled. Oh, so his deductions had been wrong, entirely and utterly wrong. It'd been a rather arrogant assumption, to suppose that Moriarty would have wanted _that _anyway. He was dug out of his disappointment by John's slowly growing look of realisation. Oh _great_.

"Sherlock, what did you… did you think… did you _want_?" John blathered, taking impossibly long to reach the almost obvious conclusion. "You, Moriarty… are you attracted to Moriarty?" John said in a voice that was incredibly small for the accusation he was making.

"Despite the fact that we seem to keep bumping guns, I don't think that that's any reason to suppose a force of magnetism is involved," Sherlock replied sarcastically, stretched back on the sofa. He knew delaying having to answer a direct question was pointless, but irrationality seemed to be a field he was improving in at the present moment. The answer just seemed to confirm John's fears further as his eyes widened and his brows knitted together, in a cute, mundane kind of way.

"You know what I meant."

"I do?" Sherlock inquired innocently, enjoying running John round in circles.

"Are you sexually attracted to Jim Moriarty?" Just the mention of the name was enough to send a thrill of excitement up Sherlock's spinal cord. Then the word sexually being placed casually - well, not _that_ casually, but still - in front of it… It started up more images, flushed his cheeks with an even deeper shade of pink. Sherlock stammered; he couldn't believe he was losing his cool, and in front of someone as simple as Watson too. He'd had enough for one day, quite enough.

"Yes," he exclaimed melodramatically, and then turned over on the sofa in a huff to show off his 'nice arse' (that comment was still ringing in his ears) to Watson. From that point on, he was officially asleep.


End file.
